Samsung will soon release its own Galaxy Tab-branded competitor in the approximately 10-inch form factor, but price, size, and battery life may be issues.

Company says it's hard at work trying to make the changes necessary to stay competitive

It looks
like Apple bought itself a bit more time atop the market with the announcement of the iPad 2. With
Android tablets coming on strong and competitors like HP's
webOS and Microsoft's
Windows 7 waiting in the ranks, all eyes were on Apple March 2.
The company delivered an impressive device that shrunk the form factor,
increased the processing power, maintained the battery life, and according to
numerous unconfirmed reports, will double the amount of RAM to 512 MB.

The iterative hardware improvements weren't much of a surprise to the
electronics industry. What seemed to take them aback was the form factor.
Lee Don-Joo, executive vice president of mobile devices at South Korean
device maker Samsung told South
Korea's publicly funded Yonhap News Agency, "We will have to improve the
parts that are inadequate [in our tablets]. Apple made it very thin."

The iPad 2 is an incredible .35 inches thin -- approximately a third of an
inch. That's approximately 33 percent thinner than the first-gen thickness
of 0.5 inch and thinner even than the 0.472 inch Samsung Galaxy Tab.

Samsung's Galaxy Tab was the first major Android tablet to be billed as a
possible "iPad slayer". However, the device was quite different
from Apple's in its strengths and weaknesses. While packing superior
hardware, it featured a smaller 7.0-inch (diagonal) LCD screen and debuted at
nearly $900 USD without contract. Those factors caused many tablet buyers
to stick with the iPad, which had an entry level Wi-Fi-only price of $499 and
9.7-inch screen.

Mr. Lee comments, "The 10-inch (tablet) was to be priced higher than the
seven-inch but we will have to think that over."

To put things in perspective, between October and December Samsung sold 2
million Galaxy Tab devices, while Apple sold 15 million iPads between April
and December. That gap becomes more noticeable when you consider how far
behind Android devices
have left the iPhone in the mobile market.

The iPad 2, like the first generation model, doesn't exactly pack the most
incredible hardware in the world. What it does do, however, is offer an
impressive form factor and equally noteworthy battery life. Both of those
marks were complaints
about the recent Xoom -- it was too bulky/heavy and the battery life
fell short of promised figures.

Both metrics are even more critical to tablets than they are to some other
mobile devices like laptops. While you can always plug in a laptop, you
seldom run a tablet plugged in, so battery life is essential. And while
your notebook computer rests comfortably on a table or your lap, you actually
hold the tablet, so weight becomes a major issue.

And what is equally surprising is that price may be the key thing keeping the
iPad as the top selling tablets. Apple has a long-standing reputation of
delivering high-end gadgets, which -- according to some -- are more than a bit
overpriced. But with the iPad it has delivered a more minimalistic
hardware set and a remarkably low hardware price.

When it comes to tablets, it's still Apple's game to lose. If it can
maintain its mobility edge (battery life, form factor) and price edge it may be
able to hold on to its lead even as Android brings out the big guns processing
power-wise.

"Google fired a shot heard 'round the world, and now a second American company has answered the call to defend the rights of the Chinese people." -- Rep. Christopher H. Smith (R-N.J.)